Sunday, 10 November 2013

Here's something you probably haven't even heard of yet. It's a little something that Google engineers have been working on for over two years, which will change the very way your Android smartphone runs apps.

A report in Korean media emerged, shedding light on Samsung’s future plans for Tizen. According to the head of Samsung Electronics’ visual display unit, the OS represents a “significant investment” for Samsung, and much progress has been achieved in its development.

Saturday, 9 November 2013

Google officially announced the 4.4 KitKat a couple of days and today, Sony has revealed its Android upgrade roadmap. In an official blog post, the Japanese manufacturer has also announced its plans with the 4.3 Jelly Bean roll out.

A couple of days ago AT&T detailed its Nokia Lumia 1520 launch plans and today it's Microsoft's turn. The Redmond company has officially detailed the Lumia 1520 availability and launched a pre-order campaign for the phablet.

Nokia Lumia 625 is the latest WP smartphone to come out of Nokia. It comes with a 4.7" WVGA IPS display, runs on a dual-core 1.2GHz Krait processor with 512MB RAM, supports LTE connectivity, and packs a 5MP snapper with 1080p video recording. Just like the Lumia 620, the Lumia 625 also offers exchangeable battery covers in different youthful colors.

A video has surfaced which shows the rumored iPhone 5S' golden casing and compares it side by side with the silver iPhone 5.

The prominent differences are the dual-LED flash cutout on the iPhone 5S casing, the different third microphone pinhole shape and the fact that the chamfered edges on the sides aren't colored and are instead just plain aluminum.

Today, O2 and Vodafone have officially launched their LTE services in the United Kingdom. However, Vodafone's LTE network is available only in London, while O2 offer's its 4G services across three cities - London, Leeds and Bradford at the moment.

The 4G LTE networks across the UK is dominated by EE, which is currently offering 4G in 100 markets in the country. EE also has the government's spectrum license and all the other carriers need to buy the spectrum through an auction from the Ofcom regulator.

Sony Xperia Z1, previously rumored as Honami, is one of the regulars in our news section lately. We already know so many things about the gadget that we wonder if Sony will have any surprises left for us at the official announcement next week.

Anyway, today's leak brings us something we haven't seen so far - the Sony Xperia Z1 in good quality high-resolution photos. No more blurry cams!

The latest rumors coming from Korea suggest Samsung is trying to lower the cost of the Galaxy Note III phablet for the emerging markets by replacing some internals with cheaper components.

To achieve a price cut, the Galaxy Note III will lose the Super AMOLED screen in favor of a regular LCD unit plus the camera will be downgraded to an 8MP one. Thanks to those sacrifices, Samsung will be able to launch the Galaxy Note III phablet at a cheaper price point in the emerging markets.

Monday, 29 July 2013

According to a listing of Indian logistics website Zaumba, the Samsung has began testing the Galaxy Note III in three different screen sizes. If Zaumba is to be believed, Samsung hasn't yet decided wether the Galaxy Note III should pack a 5.5", 5.7" or 6" display. Mind you, couple of reports clearly suggestedthat Samsung has chosen to build the Galaxy Note III around a 5.7" display, so maybe the testing is already complete.

The budget iPhone rumors started with the same back panels photographed over and over again, but slowly we're getting more believable stuff – first the FCC labels on the phone's box. Interestingly, it's labeled iPhone 5C.

The design of the box is also notable – old iPhone boxes had square angles and a big image of the phone inside. The boxes in the image are all white (no images except a black Apple logo), glossy (plastic?) and have round corners. This would fit the new design direction by Jony Ive, who really streamlined iOS with the latest version and removed all unnecessary eye candy.

MediaTek has officially announced the world's first true octa-core processor. The latest SoCs allows all the eight cores to run simultaneously, unlike the Samsung implementation, which can activate up to half of its CPU cores at once. The true octa-core processors offer you enhanced performance, power efficiency and improved user experience.

So far we’ve been pretty skeptical of the budget iPhone leaks as they bear a very strong resemblance to a certain China-built Android phone. This, however, could be the money shot - the plastic budget iPhone with FCC labels on the back.

Tuesday, 9 July 2013

Introduction

Just taking the photo won't do these days - you'll want to edit and share it, then rake in the likes. Except most cameras pretty much bail out at the snapshot. Not the Samsung Galaxy S4 zoom though, a hybrid of a point-and-shoot with 10x optical zoom and a Galaxy S4 mini. This is Samsung's second such attempt after the Galaxy Camera, which was based on the Galaxy S III.

Apple has started seeding the third version of the developer preview of iOS 7 to registered developers. If you have it installed on your device, you should have gotten a prompt to update it by now.

As usual, there are several minor changes across the board but by far the most noticeable is the change of system fonts. The first two versions of iOS 7 beta used Helvetica Neue Light, which at times was bit hard to read. The latest version changes it to Helvetica Neue Regular, which is a lot more legible. Light and Ultra Light are still visible in certain places in the UI but less frequently than before.

Other changes include bigger status bar on the lockscreen, new animation for app downloads, dots in Calendar app to indicate events on particular days, new music player controls and much more.

Friday, 5 July 2013

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd missed already modest expectations for its quarterly earnings guidance on Friday, deepening worries that its smartphone business may have peaked, as growth in sales of its blockbuster Galaxy phones begins to wane and new rivals emerge to eat away at its market share.

The Galaxy S, powered by Google's free Android platform, propelled the South Korean firm into the top rank of smartphone makers in 2012, overtaking Apple Inc whose iPhone had set an industry standard five years earlier.

Google Inc is developing a videogame console and a wristwatch based on its Android operating system, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

The devices could be available as soon as this Fall, the report, which cited anonymous sources, said.

Google, the world's No.1 Web search engine, is also working on a revamped version of the Nexus Q music-streaming device, the report said. Google unveiled the Nexus Q in June 2012, but never released the product, which received critical reviews.

Sunday, 23 June 2013

France's Socialist government aims to introduce a law preventing online retailer Amazon from offering both discounts and free delivery for books inFrance, the culture minister said, arguing this amounts to unfair competition.

Aurelie Filippetti said the government was looking for the right time to introduce a ban on the practice, which book sellers say threatens their business model by allowing Amazon to undercut their prices

Saturday, 22 June 2013

Apple Inc> Chief Executive Tim Cook's one-time stock award worth over $413 million as of Friday is now partly subject to the performance of the shares, a move that followed discussions with the company's largest shareholders.

Cook, who has presided over a 42 percent drop in Apple's share price since it touched a high of $705 in September, approached the board to impose a performance criteria on his yet-to-be-vested stocks, according to a filing on Friday

Friday, 24 May 2013

Activist investor Carl Icahn and Southeastern Asset Management Inc have initiated talks with banks and asset managers to line up commitments for as much as $7 billion in bridge loans to back their leveraged recapitalization proposal for Dell Inc, banking sources told Thomson Reuters LPC on Thursday.

Google Inc is considering buying Israeli mobile satellite navigation start-up Waze Inc, which may lead to a bidding war with Facebook Inc, Bloomberg news reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Waze is seeking more than $1 billion and is fielding expressions of interest from multiple parties, said Bloomberg, citing a source.

Apple has operated almost tax-free in Ireland since 1980, welcomed by a government keen to bring jobs to what was then one of Europe's poorest countries, former company executives and Irish officials have said.

Chief Executive Tim Cook faced criticism from a Senate subcommittee in Washington on Tuesday over the iPad and iPhone maker's tax practices, which had been shrouded from full view behind secretive tax-exempt Irish-based corporate entities.

Tuesday, 21 May 2013

Apple Inc came under fire on Tuesday at a Senate hearing over an investigation that alleged the U.S. high technology icon has kept billions of dollars in profits in Irish subsidiaries and paid little or no taxes to any government.

"Apple effectively shifts billions of dollars in profits offshore, profits that under one section of the tax code should nonetheless be subject to U.S. taxes, but through a complex process avoids those taxes," said Senator Carl Levin.

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook was slated to testify to the subcommittee at the hearing, along with other senior executives of the company.

Yahoo Inc Chief Executive Marissa Mayer's $1.1 billion acquisition of blogging service Tumblr will be a test of her ability to revive the aging Web portal. Luckily for her, her performance may be graded generously.

Mayer faces plenty of challenges in her efforts to turn six-year-old Tumblr into a money-spinner, not least among them retaining users while devising new types of non-intrusive online ads outside of Yahoo's traditional area of expertise.

And then there is Tumblr's hefty price tag: a sum that equates to a fifth of Yahoo's cash.

Ireland said on Tuesday it was not to blame for Apple Inc's low global tax payments and had no special rate deal with the company after the U.S. Senate said it paid little or no tax on tens of billions of dollars in profits stashed in Irish subsidiaries.

The Irish government, which has seen the luring of U.S. multinationals with low taxes as a key part of its economic policy since the 1960s, said its system was transparent and other countries were responsible if the tax rate paid by Apple was too low.

The Sony Xperia UL was revealed today by Japanese carrier KDDi. It packs the same 5-inch 1080p screen as the Xperia Z flagship, as well as its water and dust resistance.

The Sony Xperia UL

A 1.5 GHz quad-core processor is also in the mix, as well as the Adreno 320 GPU and 2 GB of RAM, but the real star of the show will be 13 MP camera sensor, which, besides HD video recording, is capable of taking burst photos at up to 15 frames per second. The Xperia UL also comes complete with a dedicated camera button, which the Xperia Z doesn't have.